1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method, system, and program for relocating a logical volume from a first storage location to a second storage location using a copy relationship.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a network computing environment, host systems may communicate Input/Output (“I/O”) requests to a storage controller that manages access to storage systems having the underlying data subject to the I/O request. The storage controller may configure the storage space into logical volumes, such as Logical Unit Numbers (LUNs), partitions, etc., that are presented to the host systems to use. The hosts then direct I/O requests to addressable locations in the logical volumes. The storage controllers execute the I/O requests against the addressable locations in the storage for the hosts. Users of enterprise level storage controllers, also known as enterprise storage servers, expect high availability and continuous access to the data managed by the enterprise server.
During operations, the systems administrator may desire to move a logical volume from one storage location to another for performance or space reasons. For instance, to balance I/O access among different storage locations, the system administrator may want to move a logical volume from a frequently accessed storage area to another storage area experiencing less I/O traffic. Additionally, the administrator may want to disperse logical volumes among different storage devices to minimize the impact of a storage device failure.
In many systems, host I/O access to a logical volume is delayed until the logical volume is relocated and available at the new storage location.
There is a need in the art for improved techniques for relocating a logical volume to a new storage location.